Mike Noonan

Mike Noonan, fresh off bringing Clemson its first men's soccer championship since 1987, joins the podcast to talk what it means and how his life is different.

Noonan also retraces the fateful steps that led his choosing Clemson after a 15-year career leading Brown University. Syracuse had also offered him its coaching job, and he ended up choosing the Tigers because of the warmth he and his family felt during their trip down for the interview.

Within Noonan's first year on the job at Clemson in 2010, he was appalled at the heat on a second-year football coach named Dabo Swinney amid a losing season. From what he had observed of Swinney during that short time, Noonan believed Swinney had the makings of a great coach.

Years later, Noonan was not happy when his practice fields were displaced by construction on Clemson's new football facility -- construction that began when the soccer team was in the NCAA playoffs. He remembers Swinney promising him that he'd help him get a much better soccer facility, and that promise was later fulfilled.